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Friday, March 27, 2009

Brookings’s recommendation for the G20 summit

The Brookings Institution has published an interesting collection of articles (recommendation for the upcoming G20 Summit in London).

Here is Eswar Prasad:

The crisis is likely to encourage emerging markets to export and save even more in order to build up larger stocks of foreign exchange reserves and thereby protect themselves from future financial turmoil. Self-insurance through reserve accumulation is costly, but emerging markets see little choice; borrowing from the IMF carries a stigma and remains a toxic proposition for emerging market politicians. In tandem with rising US government borrowing, this could result in larger imbalances and greater risks. Thus, the world economy again faces the classic collective action problem of how to align countries’ incentives so they take into account the effects of their policies on global financial stability.

Greater coordination of macroeconomic stimulus measures would increase the global bang for the buck of individual countries’ policies. Such coordination would not only have a direct effect by preventing leakage of any one country’s stimulus measures, but would also bolster confidence.

Here is Paul Blustein on revitalizing trade:

So the principles guiding the G-20 should be these: Make sure that the rules-based trading system survives. Don’t try now to open markets more than they already are; rather, focus on keeping protectionism, and quasi-protectionism, from becoming long-lasting features of the international economy, so that globalized trade can help the world recover and prosper anew. To the extent that anti-market policies are adopted, aim to keep them temporary and limited in scope.

One way the G-20 could give a shot in the arm to the WTO would be to declare a moratorium on new bilateral and regional pacts.

About

Formerly, economics officer at Asian Development Bank, Nepal Resident Mission. Worked as a researcher at SAWTEE, Kathmandu. Also, worked as a consultant for Ministry of Commerce & Supplies, Government of Nepal; FAO; UNDP, GIZ-CIM, and ADB among others. I was an op-ed columnist for Republica between December 2008 – June 2012. I also worked as a Junior Fellow for Trade, Equity & Development program at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington, D.C .